A Family-Focussed Wedding With Classic Style - Modern Wedding

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Jade and Anthony tied the knot in timeless sophistication with just a hint of vintage charm. Their family-filled wedding day included their four adorable children as flower girls and page boys.

F R O M T H E B R I D E

We first met...

We first met at work, we were acquaintances then friends for some time before the romance took over.

We knew it was love...

Our first proper date was Valentine's Day, we spent it at the St Kilda Festival in Melbourne and even back then I think we both knew we had something pretty special.

The proposal...

We were engaged on December 16 th 2015. Anthony told me we were going on a Christmas surprise and just to pack an overnight bag. His parents came to watch our then three children and we set off. We arrived at the airport where we boarded a flight for Tasmania (my home state), picked up a hire car and started driving towards the east coast. Our initial flight it turned out had been cancelled at 11.30pm the night before so we were running quite a bit later than he anticipated and we arrived at the Wine Glass Bay walk late in the afternoon, we had dinner booked nearby but he insisted we do the walk beforehand so we practically sprinted to the top to have time to get to dinner. When we arrived at the lookout he got down on one knee, it was utterly romantic! We were late for dinner but I didn't mind a bit and neither did they. We spent the evening at nearby cliff front accommodation with the sound of waves crashing on the private beach, perfection.

T H E W E D D I N G

Our dream wedding...

I really wanted a simple but classic wedding style but from the minute I chose my dress the style of it had a vintage element I wanted to carry through the day too.

Wedding Photographer...

Alex from I Do Indeed was our photographer, he was very approachable and easy to deal with, his prices were competitive and I loved his work. I love that my photos are so candid; a lot of my favourite shots are the ones we didn't know were being taken.

Ceremony location...

Our ceremony was in the Terrace at The Pier Geelong.

Reception venue...

Our reception was also at The Pier Geelong in The Hopetoun Room

Pre-wedding celebrations...

My hen's day was celebrated with a cocktail party at a Penthouse Suite in South Yarra. Anthony celebrated his bucks with golf followed by dinner at a Brauhaus in Melbourne.

The bridal party...

I had six bridesmaids, my sister in-law and best friend was my maid of honour, two of my best girlfriends I have known since high school and Anthony's three sisters.

Anthony had seven groomsmen, his best mate as his best man, four of his other close friends and his two brothers in law.

We also had our four children as our two flower girls and two page boys.

The bridesmaids wore...

Our bridesmaid dresses were by For Her and For Him with some minor alterations. They each chose their own shoes in a nude colour.

The groom and groomsmen wore...

The groom and groomsmen suits were by Woodstock Menswear in Melbourne, shirts by TM Lewin and ties and shoes by ASOS. They also wore cufflinks from Max & Me designs.

My wedding gown was from Melbourne Bridal and Debutante (now Ivory Bridal), it was an off-the-rack sample dress but from the minute I tried it I knew it was the one! It had a fitted bodice with sweetheart neckline and beading, the fitted style extended to a mermaid satin underskirt and was topped with a vintage lace overlay that commenced under the bust and flowed into a beautiful train. My headpiece was a vintage inspired piece by Fletcher and Grace and my shoes were from Debenhams.

Wedding flowers...

For the flowers I wanted large predominantly white blooms with accents of peach and pink offset with some fresh greenery. Beachside Blooms supplied all our flowers for bouquets, centrepieces, buttonholes and cake.

Reception décor...

The centrepieces were gorgeous gold four post towers with gold tea lights topped with floral arrangements in similar styling to our bouquets with some more brights. Table Top Towers supplied all our centrepieces and our 6ft towers for the ceremony and reception. Our place settings were hand written place cards to match our wedding invitations with Christmas baubles as bomboniere.

Our cake was a 3 tier mud cake in different flavours with buttercream icing made by Daisy Jane's Cakes.

Our cars were two stunning classic 60's Lincolns, a black hard top and a powder blue convertible supplied by Classic Lincoln Limos.

On the menu...

We had a sit down menu commencing with canapés on arrival then spinach & ricotta tortellini with pesto cream sauce and parmesan alternating with twice cooked pork belly on pickled green cabbage salad with Shiraz jus.

For main course we had three alternating dishes consisting of 250g Angus porterhouse served with braised baby leek and creamy mash with sticky onion jus, oven baked chicken breast served with smashed chat potatoes and broccolini with forest mushroom sauce and a fillet of Atlantic salmon served with beetroot relish, green beans and sweet potato mash.

For dessert we served wedding cake and had a gelato cart by Bianco Latte serving three dairy based ice-creams in salted caramel, white chocolate & raspberry or Nutella flavour in addition to three sorbets in raspberry, lemon & passionfruit or dark chocolate flavours.

Bomboniere...

For bomboniere we bulk bought large clear Christmas baubles, which we filled with wooden hearts we painted white and stamped in gold with personalised stamps we had made. The front side said, all you need is love, and the back side said Thank you with our names and date. They were displayed on the tables in clear boxes with gold ribbon.

Memorable moments...

The rings were forgotten!

The preparations all went well and we commenced the ceremony pretty much according to plan. The moment our celebrant asked us to face each other Anthony's expression changed to horror and he buried his face in his hands, I looked at Nick, the best man, who was white as a sheet and knew it wasn't a joke, seven groomsmen and they had legitimately forgotten the rings! Thankfully they were only about a 1km round trip away so two of our groomsmen left to retrieve them, although one stopped outside to call an Uber! And after a brief and rather hilarious intermission the ceremony concluded without further issue.

Wedding soundtrack...

The bridal procession was an acoustic rendition of Such Great Heights by the Postal Service performed by one of our groomsmen and MC, Michael McKay.

We signed the registry to You Got the Silver by The Rolling Stones.

The recessional song was Anywhere by Passenger.

The Bridal party entered the reception to the riff from Seven Nation Army by The White Stripes performed by our band on the night, The Bombastics.

The Bridal Waltz was based on an Ed Sheeran acoustic cover of Snow Patrol's Chasing Cars also performed by The Bombastics.

M A R R I E D L I F E

The honeymoon...

We are honeymooning later this year in Vanuatu

Future plans...

With four children together our family is complete so now we can enjoy watching them grow. We hope to always have a house full of love wherever we are! As the children get older we will hopefully enjoy some more travel both with and without them and while we have lived in and owned a few properties we are still working towards finding our forever home.

In 40 years you hope to...

Be enjoying every minute with my husband and our beautiful big happy family!

W E D D I NG W I S D O M

The engagement...

Don't sweat the small stuff.

Planning...

Be decisive, trust your gut! Choose what you like and go with it!

On the day...

Everything that can be done has been done, so just relax and enjoy the day! Laugh at the unexpected, it makes your day unique.